Cobb happy with first rehab start for Stone Crabs

PORT CHARLOTTE — It did not take Alex Cobb long to put his injury to the test.

On the third batter of the game, Cobb was forced to cover first for a successful 3-6-1 double play, reaching back slightly to take the relay throw.

If there was any doubt concerning his strained left oblique, it quickly was erased.

“It was a normal game. Different plays and different scenarios happen,” Cobb said. “I got a lot of runners on, so I got to work out of the stretch a lot. I got to work out of the windup quite a bit too. It went as good as planned.”

In his first rehab assignment with the Charlotte Stone Crabs in the Class A Florida State League, Cobb threw 64 pitches in five innings, allowing three hits while striking out nine against the Clearwater Threshers in front of 3,583 fans Saturday night at Charlotte Sports Park.

If he has his way, Cobb will make his next appearance with the Tampa Bay Rays on Thursday against the Oakland A’s at Tropicana Field.

“I would love for that to be the case,” he said.

Cobb will make his case with Tampa Bay manager Joe Maddon, pitching coach Jim Hickey and the medical training staff in the next day or two.

“We’ll see what the best step going forward,” Cobb said. “Yeah, I feel physically able to compete in a big league game for sure.”

Cobb was pleased with his change in velocity from 92 miles per hour with the fastball to 86 with the breaking pitch to 80 with the changeup.

“I went out there and threw all my pitches and didn’t have any residual feelings of any pain coming back or any thoughts of pain coming back, so I was just out there being aggressive,” he said. “Everything was coming out good, so I was pleased with it.”

He threw 46 strikes and would have been more around the strike zone if not for the aggressiveness of the Class A hitters.

“I was trying to throw a normal game plan as I would typically, but guys are pretty aggressive down here, so you have to throw out of zone a little bit,” said Cobb, who picked up the victory in the Stone Crabs 2-0 whitewash of the Threshers. “That’s all right, because I felt fastball command was pretty good.”

Opening the season as the No. 2 starter, Cobb went 1-1 with a 1.89 earned run average in his three starts with Tampa Bay. In 19 innings he allowed 12 hits and four runs while walking five and striking out 14.

The 26-year-old went on the disabled list after throwing seven shutout innings April 12 against the Reds in Cincinnati, stretching his scoreless streak to 15 1/3 innings.

“Rest,” Cobb said when asked for the remedy of a strained oblique. “Don’t sneeze too much. You just try to care for it as much as you can throughout the day. It’s tough because it’s every single motion that you can think of you use the oblique. It was letting it heal and not letting my arm strength go away too much.”

After resting his arm for about 10 days and did prescribed arm exercises before throwing.

“It was good enough to where I could throw,” he said. “I didn’t throw real aggressively. I just played catch. Sometimes that’s enough to keep it going. It’s feeling strong. Whatever we did worked. The arm strength stayed where it was before I went on the DL.”

That led to Monday’s controlled simulated game in Port Charlotte.

“That’s really the biggest process in all this is building back up,” he said. “If you can pick up where you left off, it will shorten the time span a little bit.”

The Rays are hurting in the starting pitching department with Matt Moore sidelined for the remainder of the season after undergoing ligament replacement surgery in his left (pitching) elbow and Jeremy Hellickson working his way back from elbow surgery.

Cobb’s performance came on the heels of another outing by Alex Colome, who is serving a 50-game suspension for violating Major League Baseball’s Joint Drug Prevention and Treatment Program

Pitching for the third time Friday for the Stone Crabs, the 25-year-old right-hander has a 1.64 ERA, giving up seven hits and two runs in 11 innings with five walks and 10 strikeouts.